Independence Day
by Virginia Cartwright
Summary: A recollection of injuries
1. E: And then, I seemingly deceased

His fault. Of course it was his fault. Right? Oh how horribly pitiful I am right now, sitting on the floor with his picture in one hand. No, there are none of the cliché tears running down my red, white, and blackened blue face, there are only dry, heaving sobs that shake my now frail body and leave me gasping desperately for oxygen. Broken glass from the mirror above the mantle lies around me, creating a rainbow of sparkling shards. It is not beautiful. Dizzy, spinning, intoxicated eyes of mine see and shun the glassy, shining spectacle, and all I can think of is how much I hate this day, how much I hated that day, how much I hated him, and how much I absolutely despise myself. I cannot help but contemplate, was he rebelling recklessly, or was there method in the madness that seemed to overtake that small figure of his? My eyes are bloodshot and blackened by bruises, skin pale, any strength I once had has fallen to him. Curse it all. I don't even care anymore. Smashing the treasured trophy of triumphant smiles in the long gone past and watching it shatter in to a trillion brilliant tiny pieces as I spring upwards in my rage feels so good, so uplifting. I feel tiny bits of the glass from the picture frame fly up and embed themselves in my once unmarred and unmarked skin, making my spine shiver in a curious, masochistic, twisted form of delight. I smash the picture with my foot, and scream not from the pain of glass but from the pain that is ripping my heart to shreds. As I look down I see not a destroyed memory but a crushed frame, crushed hopes and dreams, and my crushed self. Suddenly sick to my stomach- probably the alcohol- I collapse onto the shards of sharp glass and vomit onto the floor and many things on it. But not the picture, oh no, not on the sacred picture. I stare at it, angered, ashamed, and my eyes settle on his smile. Smiling… that foolish man… the audacity to smile, laugh, mock me. I howl painfully, and finally let the first of many, many tears spill out of my now dulled eyes.


	2. A: A realization

Today couldn't be merrier for me, as I live thanks to the liberation granted to me on this sunny, bright day. Certainly, it was raining for him, as it always did on this most amazing and glorious day on which I thank God for my lovely and perfect life. I can only hope that although his eyes may be clouded by the precipitation that pestered him so often, I may be able to clear them with the brightest blue of beyond the boundaries that separated he and I. Maybe not, but one can attempt to cure the sadness that they've startled into existence. I jog up to his porch and rap on the door furiously, as opposed to the casual strolling I usually am so used to. Excitement shoots through my veins as I wait eagerly for him to open the door so I can comfort him, console him, before he reaches for the alcohol…the knives…the pins and needles…before the pain I know he goes through every year on this day continues to torture his continually deteriorating health. I'm thinking back, and I realize only now that every year he's been here, alone, and every year he comes back to life in worse and worse shape. W-why? Why does he do this to himself? Does he realize what he's doing? Does he?


	3. A: In which I am a savior

Minutes have passed in pensive awareness. Something is wrong. The ecstatic smile I wore only moments before has been replaced by a nervous, plastic twisting and tilting upwards of my twitching and trembling lips. I know that something is terribly, horribly wrong. No matter how angry, depressed, delusional or down trodden, I know he would open the door, and make some sarcastic statement to hide his momentary fragility like the old English sot I know he is. I pound the door one last time, and yell that I'm coming in, before kicking the perfectly, uniformly white door inwards and crashing into his house. I search for him, call his name, and I hear nothing. My heart is racing as I run throughout the length of every hall, scouring for a sign of him. There, a small hall that was hidden, I turn in and I am immediately assaulted by a horrid smell and a worse sight. There he is, his tiny, bony figure lying in a pool of tears, vomit, blood, and broken glass. Muffled sobs shake his frail frame and I cannot help but pity him. I know what my role in this is at the moment, and I lift my feet carefully so as not to stab my thinly shoed feet as I walk over to him. "Calm down," I say, hoping my voice does not crack, does not show a single droplet of possible weakness, and he begins to quake, and shake uncontrollably as he heaves and cries, "okay, Arthur?"


	4. E: Eternal Slumber

This is not real, not really. It can't be. I feel like I am the embodiment of the word 'surreal', and I have good reason to. My vomit-covered clothes cling to my skin, wet as they are due to the pool of sickeningly salty tears and sweat and wretched blood that I was drowning in only moments before. If only it were real… if only… maybe then I could survive. In reality, I know that it is only my twisted, intoxicated brain playing its masochistic mind games on me. He feels so real… his voice is so real… it is almost like tangible truth- if only such a divine thing ever existed. I remember a poem I once read, and I scream at the last line….

_No true story ever ends_

_No tangible truth ever lies_

_No live human ever passes by_

_And only heroes ever truly die_

What am I in this vile, passionate fairy-tale? Am I the story- invincible, irreplaceable, and immortal as God? Am I the truth- never to lie lest my spine be shattered like the glass I pierced myself with only earlier? Am I the human- living a life splendidly unnoticed by the whole of society? I could not be the hero. He is the savior of the dejected soul I harbor.

"We'll make everything better, righ-"

Despite this statement, I believe I have just died a truer death than any hero the world has ever heard of.

"Arthur? D-don't… please…" he cries as he looks down at me.

'No,' I tell myself, 'it is not him. He is not here. He…'

Now is the moment in which I close my eyes, and sleep softly and eternally in the loving arms my desperate and deprived imagination has depicted and created.

-xxx-


End file.
